Acolyte (29 page)

‘Shit,' said Jonah, getting out. He caught sight of Silva as he vanished around a corner ahead. He followed. The street was dotted with restaurants, cafes and bars. It was getting busy, the sun low in the sky. The air had a chill, but it was warmer than the last few days had been. A relaxed Friday. Jonah rounded the corner in time to see Silva slip into the growing crowd. He hurried on, finding himself moving against the flow of people. He caught a glimpse of the man's head further on, going into a shop. Jonah drew closer, slowly, until he reached the store window. He looked through the glass. The man was at the back of the store browsing through a rack of gift cards. Jonah watched him, looking hard at his shoulder. He thought he saw some kind of dark blur there for a moment, but then there was nothing – he couldn't be sure if he'd not just imagined it. He was trying to understand what let him see the shadows. It didn't matter how close he got if he couldn't manage that.

When Jonah looked up to the man's face, Silva was looking right at him. Jonah met his gaze for an instant before he turned away; long enough to know Silva was wary of the scrutiny.

As Silva left the store Jonah was careful to keep his eyes elsewhere, but he was sure he could feel the man glance towards him. He waited a few seconds before risking looking.

The man was weaving through the stream of people. Jonah could see nothing on the shoulder now, but he didn't think he'd recaptured his ability. The whole exercise was at risk of being a complete waste of time. He pushed onwards, keeping his distance,
desperately trying to think himself into the required state, whatever that was.

Silva stopped outside a restaurant window at the corner of the street ahead and stood, clearly waiting for someone. Jonah looked at the ground as he walked. He would only have one more chance, he thought, and it all depended on regaining whatever sight it was that let him see the creatures. Then all he would have to do would be to walk past, snatch a glance from close quarters, and it would be done. He could return to the safe house and lock the door again.

He thought back to Torrance in the interview room, Torrance in his office; and Heggarty, too, the pulsating shape crouching there, almost nuzzling the agent's neck.

He could
feel
it happen then, as he recalled Heggarty's smiling face looking at him. He could feel the fear creep in, his skin growing cold, the hairs on his neck bristling, and with it he felt the almost-familiar sensitivity return. Now he just had to get close enough.

But as he looked up, Silva was nowhere in sight. There was nobody standing outside the restaurant as he reached it. He looked around urgently, and peered through the restaurant window, but he couldn't see Silva anywhere.

Then a hand fell on his shoulder, gripping it.

‘Are you following me?' said the voice behind him.

Jonah turned, freeing himself from the grip. He saw the wary look on Silva's face as he studied Jonah. Doubtless the man was wondering if he was a threat: a thief perhaps, following him to evaluate a potential target. Jonah was ready with his excuse:
I thought you were someone I knew … My mistake.

But nothing came out.

Instead, Jonah's eyes locked onto the man's shoulder, onto the glistening shape he could now see there. It was far smaller than Torrance's, but Jonah could tell that his sight was sharper than it had ever been. He could see it so clearly, even against the dark
material of the jacket Silva wore. The fingers, thin and long, stretched down over the collarbone, black lines buried in the man's flesh. The bulk of it was on his shoulder, the size of a fist, the skin that of a mollusc, dark and moist, mottled with a lighter brown like that of a slug. Barely moving, the shape was without much form, save for slow protuberances pushing out and receding slightly, as if it was tasting the air.

Jonah was suddenly aware of the smell of tainted meat.

‘Are you
following
me?' the man said again.

Jonah tore his eyes from the thing on Silva's shoulder, aware of the unease that had to be clear on his face. ‘I'm sorry,' he said, his voice uneven. ‘I thought you were someone else.' His eyes sought out the shape again, briefly, and he could see the man noting the glance.

Silva's hand went to his shoulder, Jonah's unease growing as the hand seemed to pass through the shape to scratch at the flesh below. The creature's movement increased, pulsing regularly, giving it the look of a rotting heart trying to beat into life. The man's eyes turned back to Jonah. The cold glare made it obvious that he'd realized Jonah was a greater threat to him than a mere thief.

Silva was taller than Jonah and well built. The man's hand came out and grabbed Jonah's upper arm, holding tight. Jonah tried to pull away but the grip was solid. It would take a much greater effort to tug free, he knew; it could trigger a scuffle, enough to draw much more attention from those around him. He wasn't quite ready to force such an escalation, not yet.

The man reached into his pocket and took out a phone. Jonah had a sudden image of reinforcements being summoned, of being surrounded by malevolent faces, every shoulder bearing a large, pulsating shadow, eager to loosen its fingers and pounce. The image made him lash out with his free arm, taking Silva by surprise. The phone clattered to the ground, out of reach. Silva swore and made to step nearer to it, but he wasn't going to let go of
Jonah, and Jonah was holding his ground. For a few seconds, neither moved.

‘Lucas?' said a voice. Jonah looked to his right and saw her, a tall Asian woman with a boy of six or seven holding her hand.

‘Daddy!' said the child, oblivious to the tension, but the woman's face showed real concern.

She looked between Jonah and Silva, wary. ‘Lucas, what's going on?'

‘He was following me,' said Silva.

‘I thought he was someone I knew,' said Jonah. He knew he had to get as much fearful vulnerability into his voice as possible, but he didn't have to work hard to fake it. ‘Please. It was just a misunderstanding.' He looked pointedly at where Silva still had a tight grip on his arm.

The woman clearly didn't approve of what Silva was doing. ‘Come on, Lucas,' she said. ‘The table's booked, just let the guy go.'

Silva said nothing, but seemed reluctant.

‘I just want to have a nice meal, honey,' she said. ‘Don't be like this.'

‘He was
following
me,' said Silva, anger in his voice, but the woman stayed quiet, not one to take no for an answer. After a moment Silva let go.

‘Thank you,' said Jonah. The woman's eyes showed no patience: she was giving him the benefit of the doubt and, in turn, he needed to be out of their sight as soon as physically possible. Jonah wanted to do exactly that, but instead he froze.

On the woman's shoulder was something different, something new. A small thing, flat, thin; little bigger than a quarter. The same slug-like skin of the shadows, and a regular pulse.

It was a bud, he thought; the beginnings, a seed taking slow root.

He looked at the woman. Her face was growing more hostile, but he was certain the hostility was simply because he'd not left yet, not because of what he'd seen.
She doesn't know
, he thought.
She doesn't know it's there.
Jonah's mouth opened as if he was about to speak, but he didn't know what to say. He looked back and forth from her eyes to her shoulder, the blood draining from his face. The woman's hostile expression shifted to bewilderment, then to concern.

Beside her, a small voice spoke up. ‘Is the man sick, mama?' said the little boy, and Jonah looked down.

He stared, suddenly dizzy. ‘I'm sorry,' he managed to say. He strode off, hoping the dizziness wouldn't make him stumble; stumble, then fall and wake to a crowd of unkind faces. He picked up speed, crossing the street, looking ahead desperately for Kendrick's car.

He tried not to think about the woman, or about the second dark bud he'd seen, growing on the child's shoulder.

Annabel heard the knock in her dreams. Her unconscious mind incorporated the sound; she woke from an image of an ancient door, set deep in stone, beginning to swing wide open.

She sat up. The knock came again – her hotel room door. ‘Coming.'

She'd slept in her clothes. Given the daylight creeping around the edge of the curtains in the hotel room, she realized she'd slept for far longer than she'd intended. She reached for her phone, wondering if it was past check-out time and the knock could be someone from the hotel come to evict her, but it was only nine-forty.

She tugged the curtains back and opened her eyes wide into the bright day, wincing. Then she went to the door and looked through the peephole. Outside stood a slight, young woman in staff uniform. Short, bored, and barely out of school by the look of her, Annabel thought. College job, maybe. She opened the door.

‘Hi,' said the woman, with a staff smile. The smile faltered when the door across the corridor opened behind her, and a family of two tired parents and two exuberant children emerged.

Annabel felt the hairs on her arm stand up. Something was wrong here, something about the way the woman's smile had changed as she'd turned to look at the family.

Just being stupid
, she thought – the half-remembered dream had left her a little shaken – but even so, she found herself moving
back from the door while the woman was distracted, crossing the room in four quick strides before the woman's face turned back to her. There was an element of confusion clear on it, presumably from Annabel's rapid retreat.

‘Sorry,' said the woman, the staff smile back in place. ‘My name's Lisa. We have a little problem with water coming through the ceiling downstairs, right under here. They sent me up to check if the source might be your bathroom.'

Lisa motioned to the bathroom door, clearly wanting Annabel to approach it. Annabel stayed where she was, watching as Lisa managed to let her smile slip again, just a fraction. Lisa entered the hotel room fully, closing the door behind her, then walked over to the bathroom and put her head inside for a moment.

Annabel still felt dazed from waking so suddenly, but her adrenaline was flowing. Every movement the woman made seemed suspicious to her now.

‘Ah,' said Lisa, looking back to Annabel again. ‘Yes. Take a look.' Annabel noted that the woman had one hand tightly closed.

‘Sure,' said Annabel, her left hand reaching to the wall-table beside her and grabbing hold of something she'd seen the moment her suspicions had started, keeping it close to her side, out of sight; something that was probably the reason she'd crossed the room in the first place.

She walked towards Lisa, who had put her head back inside the bathroom. With every step, Annabel wondered if she was making a terrible error of judgement.

Lisa suddenly began to turn towards Annabel again. Startled, Annabel swung hard. The flat metal of the hotel iron she was holding connected with Lisa's forehead; there was a look of sheer disbelief on the woman's face as her head shot back and thumped against the door frame. She fell.

Annabel dropped the iron. ‘Holy fuck,' she said to the quiet room, appalled at what she'd done, suddenly certain that she'd
been wrong, that being torn from a bad dream had left her so disoriented that she'd ended up doing something unforgivable.

She knelt and checked the woman, who seemed knocked out, no worse, her pulse and breathing normal.

Shit
, she thought. She didn't need trouble, not now. Plan, then: get out of the hotel. Drive. Housekeeping would find the woman soon enough, right? Hell, the people who'd sent her to check on the plumbing would …

‘Hang on,' Annabel said. She stood, and stepped inside the bathroom. Nothing was wrong – nothing visible anyway.
Take a look
, Lisa had said. What the hell at?

She knelt by the woman again and spread the fingers on Lisa's left hand, the hand that had been kept closed since she'd entered the room. Within was a white plastic aerosol of some kind. She took it from Lisa's hand and examined it. No markings, no label. Just a small canister, maybe three inches long. She wondered what the hell it was. It looked like a breath freshener.

Or mace.

Annabel ran her hand under the small of Lisa's back, only half surprised when she found a gun. Extremely compact, thin, lightweight. No ordinary firearm, not by a long way.

She looked at the woman, reassessing the impression she'd had of a young student making a little extra cash.

Then Lisa's eyes snapped open. Annabel froze, seeing the dazed look in those eyes change in a flash to single-minded focus. The woman lunged. Annabel let out a yelp as she lost balance and went over, the gun falling from her grip, Lisa on top of her now, the unexpected strength in those slight arms threatening to overwhelm her. She tried to wrench free. Lisa's hand was tight around her wrists, but the woman wasn't quite over the blow to her head; for an instant her eyes lost focus again and her grip slackened. Annabel felt it start to tighten up once more but she took the opportunity and slipped her left hand from Lisa's grip, bringing up the white canister.

‘Wait!' was all Lisa managed to get out as the fine spray hit her in the face. Annabel didn't dare breath. She watched as Lisa slackened, then slumped.

Annabel worked her way out from underneath the woman's dead weight. She stood, staring at the canister in her hand, then checked Lisa's pulse again. It seemed OK. ‘I guess that answers one question,' she said. Whatever the hell was in the canister, it wasn't mace.

She grabbed her bag, threw the gun and the canister into it, and left the hotel.

It was dark and cold by the time Jonah and Kendrick got back from Bethlehem to the safe house. The heating in the old house was having trouble keeping the chill out, but as Jonah thought about what he'd seen perhaps nothing would have made him feel warm.